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The Habit of Art

Actors are rehearsing a play called Caliban's Day at the National Theatre about Benjamin Britten, sailing uncomfortably close to the wind with his new opera Death in Venice, who is seeking advice from his former collaborator and friend, W H Auden.…

The Habit of Art

Cast Size

6m, 1f

SubGenre

Subgenre

Biography, Period

Audience

Target Audience

Adult

Additional Info

Actors are rehearsing a play called Caliban's Day at the National Theatre about Benjamin Britten, sailing uncomfortably close to the wind with his new opera Death in Venice, who is seeking advice from his former collaborator and friend, W H Auden. During this imagined meeting in 1973, their first for twenty-five years, they are observed and interrupted by, amongst others, their future biographer and a young man from the local bus station. Alan Bennett's play is as much about the theatre as it is about poetry or music. It looks at the unsettling desires of two difficult men, and at the ethics of biography. It reflects on growing old, on creativity and inspiration, and on persisting when all passion's spent: ultimately, on the habit of art.

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Reviews

"...the play has the characteristic Bennett mix of wit and wistfulness." - The Guardian, Read more

"The Habit of Art is another absolute cracker, often wonderfully and sometimes filthily funny... but also deeply and unexpectedly moving." - The Telegraph, Read more

Production

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Authors

Alan Bennett was born in Leeds in 1934. After studying at Oxford University he collaborated as a writer and performer with Dudley Moore, Jonathan Miller and Peter Cook in Beyond the Fringe in 1960 at the Edinburgh Festival.
He then turned to writing full time and produced his first stage play Forty Years On in 1968. ...